~ A Journey to Change the World

hekima – wisdom, understanding;

Going on YouTube has its advantages. Whenever I am looking to find a new, creative knot for my tie or searching for yet another TEDTalk that will change my outlook on life, YouTube does the trick. But, many a time, I have been swallowed by this video-monster and lost hours of valuable time to old clips of Whose Line Is It Anyway or Elton John’s greatest hits. In June of this past summer, I stumbled upon a video that detailed an orphanage worlds and cultures away from my existence in southern New Jersey—Hekima Place. After being glued to the screen for six and a half minutes, I knew that Hekima was a place that could benefit from my time; but more importantly, my life could be benefitted by time at Hekima.

So, there I was, sitting in my kitchen with a Starbucks coffee in one hand, my iPhone in the other, and a Macbook Air in front of me. I scrolled through my contacts and began typing up letters asking for donations to fund a trip I had very little knowledge about. Fast forward to December, thousands of dollars poured in through the mail with notes of support and well-wishes on behalf of my quest to further the education of the poor, yet nothing-short-of-deserving children in one of Africa’s poorest nations.

January 3rd, 2014 at 5:30pm…I will leave my oftentimes-ethnocentric home country and fall into the warm embrace of the Kenyan people. The University of Delaware, friends and family have given me the platform to altruistically serve children that are disadvantaged for reasons no deeper than that of geography.

Hekima in kiswahili means “wisdom.”

Wisdom: the quality of having knowledge, understanding and experience.

I am leaving behind the familiarity that is my possessions, my culture, and my family. Yes, even my greatest love of all— venti iced-coffee w/ skim from the greatest company to ever emerge from Seattle, WA. But I venture a guess that my time in Nairobi will be filled with shock, awe, and the discovery of immense treasure.